Rotating Ball Cleaning Device

ABSTRACT

The invention is an apparatus to clean leather items, including removal of dirt stains, grass stains, and scuff marks, including, but not limited to, baseballs, softballs, footballs and shoes. The apparatus holds a removable hollow barrel-shaped container in which the items to be cleaned are placed, along with pieces of a rubber or gummy material. The apparatus revolves the container so the mixture of rubber pieces and items to be cleaned mix together, the erratic motion of the eraser material buffing the items clean. A straining element in the barrel allows a user to separate the items being cleaned from the rubber material and removed debris by standing the barrel on its end, after which a user opens a door in the barrel above the strainer.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

Not Applicable

STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT

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THE NAMES OF THE PARTIES TO A JOINT RESEARCH AGREEMENT

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INCORPORATION-BY-REFERENCE OF THE MATERIAL ON THE COMPACT DISC.

Not Applicable

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

(1) Field of the Invention

The present invention pertains to the process of cleaning baseballs, softballs, and other leather goods, which have been discolored or dirtied in use by polishing them with small pieces of rubber.

(2) Description of the Related Art Including Information Disclosed Under 37 CFR 1.97 and 1.98

As baseballs are used, they collect dirt and grass stains on the leather cover, resulting in discoloration. The blemishes on the balls detract from the players' ability to discern the ball's rotation by reducing the contrast between the seams and the leather, making the seams less visible. Because players look for the seams and watch for the ball's rotation, balls eventually are discarded due to their discoloration. Cleaning the balls extends their useful life.

Baseballs are cleaned by many methods, including traditional leather cleaning goods, and the use of erasers (real or synthetic) to spot polish the discolored area and remove the stains.

Rotating containers which mix small blocks of rubber with baseballs are known in the industry. These devices clean leather baseballs and other similar items by tumbling them in a container with rubber or gum material, similar to the way that a gem polishing device operates. One example of this device is the “Baseball Renewer”, found at http://baseballrenewer.wordpress.com/baseball-renewer/.

Existing devices are heavy and awkward to move. The balls must be separated from the rubber material, or pulled out of the container individually. What is needed in the industry is a ball cleaner that is more mobile, sifts the balls from the rubber polishing material, and allows the balls to be removed or poured from the container without an additional filtering step requiring human action.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The general object of the invention is to employ a construction of the invention so that the rotating container may be removed from the rest of the device with ease. This advantage allows the device to be kept in a storage facility, and the ball container used as a mobile container for baseball transport. When the game play is ended, the balls can be collected and put back into the container, and then the container placed back into the apparatus, allowing the ball cleaning cycle to easily be repeated.

The container may also be fashioned so that a strainer placed in its interior can separate the eraser material from the balls merely by changing the orientation of the container from lying on its side (as it does during the cleaning process while it is rotates), to a vertical position, when the strainer allows the rubber material to fall through. The strainer's filtering holes must be a matching size to the rubber pieces, so they fall through, but the baseballs do not.

Additional objects, advantages and novel features of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon examination of the following or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and attained by means of the instrumentalities and combinations pointed out in the appended claims.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWING(S)

The attached drawings are provided as a non-limiting example of the invention, specifically:

FIG. 1—Orthogonal view of the invention.

FIG. 2—A front sectional view of the drum, including an optional internal filter and side drum door.

FIG. 3—Exploded view of the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

According to the present invention, the foregoing and other objects and advantages are attained by a hollow drum container 11 that is mounted on a supporting apparatus 13 that rotates the drum, as seen in FIG. 1.

As seen in FIG. 2, an optional screen filter 15 may be installed inside the drum, with the filter constructed to separate the baseballs 17 from the rubber cleaning material 19, with the filter 15 oriented in the drum so that the rubber material falls through it when the drum is set on its end.

Baseballs may be placed in the drum by removal of one of the drum ends, or by an optional door 21 in the side of the drum, as seen in FIG. 2.

FIG. 2 shows the filter 15 installed at an oblique angle to the drum ends, so when the drum is set on end, the rubber material falls through and the balls are pulled to the lower side of the screen and gravity fed through a drum door 21 in the side of the drum. FIG. 2 shows an expected best mode angle of 30° to 45°, but for simpler construction, the filter may be installed parallel to the drum's ends (angle of 0°), and a user simply opens the drum door 21 and pulls the balls out.

The means for rotating the apparatus are varied and many. One method is shown in the exploded view of the apparatus in FIG. 3, which is the best means yet known to the inventors, which shows a motor 21 mounted in the supporting apparatus 13. The motor 21 is connected to rollers 23 that support and turn the drum 11.

The invention was developed to clean baseballs and softballs, but may be used in different-sized versions to clean footballs, volleyballs or soccer balls, or any leather object sufficiently rugged to be abrasively cleaned by the rubber material.

SEQUENCE LISTING

Not Applicable 

1) An apparatus for cleaning leather goods, comprising: a. a barrel-shaped container having one or more portals, and b. a structure to hold the container in a position such that the barrel may be rotated on its side, said structure equipped with a means to rotate the container and allowing for easy separation of the container from the supporting structure, and c. an elastomeric material in loose bulk form placed inside the container, such that rotation of the container causes the material to buff leather items also in the container at the same time; 2) An apparatus as in claim #1, with a strainer placed in the container, constructed with holes specifically sized to allow the eraser material to fall through, but does not allow the items to be cleaned to fall beneath the strainer when the barrel is set upright on one end. 